We are told to treat a person with disability as if they don’t have a disability, but when it comes to classism I feel that we should give a person of disability some leeway. Not only do they not have the choice of being disabled, but growing up, a student doesn’t have an impact on their family’s income and their family’s class status. Students with disability not only have to worry about paying for an education but they have to worry about incidental costs such as medications, trips to the doctor, medical bills, and money spent on specialty foods needed to meet dietary restrictions. Classism is huge in our country, and of course judgment is the first thing to determine what class a person belongs to. When traveling you tend to realize who categorizes as high class and who categorize as low class, at least as we are told to see it. You may think that a person nicely dressed in a suit with a brief case riding first class is very wealthy and of high income, but truly you have no idea. A person of disability may have an outstanding economic class but we may not realize it because most of their money is spent on medical situations and the last thing they worry about is dressing in designers clothing, having the largest house and the newest car. I feel most people with disability have a harder time managing a high class because they are spender more time and money on things for their disability. It’s too bad that classism is mainly based on judgment and a lot of the time people tend to look down on those of lower class.
I agree with you in that people put others into their "class" by purely judgment based off appearance and where they were noticed. I think that many people should realize that appearance does not necessarily always matter for class.
ReplyDeleteI also agree that somebody's class is often judged based upon their looks. I liked how you incorporated your beliefs on how people with disabilities are judged upon their physical aspects, which is unfortunate. It really is too bad that classism is almost always based on judgments that could be misinterpreted.
ReplyDeleteI like how you talked about disabilities. People can be horrible to people with disabilities. I especially feel for those who have disabilities we can't see. They look "normal" to the people around them so when they say oh I have a disability it is as though they are lying to get attention or cop out of something. For example people who need food stamps because they have a lot of medical bills to pay. They might have a good job and make six figures but one does not qualify for much financial help if that is their salary, regardless of medical bills. Not for all situations, but some.
ReplyDeletePeople with disabilities are one of the poorest groups in the U.S. When we get to ableism we will talk more about this, but often people with disabilities are blamed for their financial situation. Ableism combines with classism to render poor disabled people in a situation of multiple jeopardy.
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